Ear. . .

I have been a swimmer all my life. . . never once in my life have I got an ear infection or swimmer's ear.

My family and I went to Bear Lake the end of August for family fun before everyone went back to school and work. We had a great time. Then on Sunday after family pictures my left ear really started to hurt and I was having trouble hearing out of the left ear too.. Mom set an appointment with Dr. Dawson to get it look at.

Dr. Dawson looked at it and declared it a double ear infection. Which means I had an infection behind my ear drum and in front of it too. Fun!  He prescribed a oral antibiotic call Zithromax. Hopefully, this will fix it.

WRONG!!!

The pain started to get worse and worse. I couldn't do anything without being in pain. I stayed up most nights because my ear hurt too bad to sleep and advil wasn't helping at all. So after two days of this Mom called Dr. Dawson and I was prescribed an numbing ear drop. That was heavenly, it didn't take the pain away completely but it got ride of it enough that I could actually sleep. I slept like a rock that night until Mom woke me up when she got home from work to put more in.

After about a week my ear still didn't feel a whole lot better so off to Dr. Dawson again. He took a culture of my ear, cleaned it out, and gave my another PO antibiotic called Ciprofolaxcin. Hopefully, this will fix it. I went back up to school hoping that I wouldn't need to go see a doctor but. . .

WRONG!!!

The ear still wasn't better so Dad found me a ENT doctor in Idaho Falls that took the insurance. Dr. Lee took a look at my ear and said yep it was infected still (this was the 20th of September). Great just what I needed. So Dr. Lee prescribed me Floxcin (ear drop) for seven days and that should clear the problem up. I was also told not to get any water in my left ear, I have to cover a cotton ball with Vaseline and stick it in my ear when I wanted to shower. That was incredibly gross.

I finished the antibiotics and my ear felt great... then three days after the medication was finished my ear started to hurt again and it started to itch. So did the antibiotics work?

WRONG!!!

I called back and got another appointment for October 11. He looked right at my ear and could tell that it wasn't better. I was not surprised one bit of course it wouldn't be better just knowing my luck. He cleaned it out with suction and said that the bacterial infection in my ear has turned into a fungal infection.

Now I know what you are thinking how does a bacteria turn into a fungus? Well my friends if a bacterial infection goes on for a extended period of time it mutates into fungus. Brilliant huh?

So now I have this cream that I have to stick in my ear twice a day for three days and if it doesn't feel better by Friday I have to call back and see Dr. Lee again that day, but if it does I have a follow up on Tuesday.

That is the adventure of my left ear for the entire month of September and half of October. I just want it to be gone by my birthday. I would really like to be pain free, drainage free, and be able to hear again.